A New Reign

3 || The Boy That Lived

Book 1 || Chapter 3

Selina

"So sorry to interrupt, but have either of you seen a toad? Neville has lost one," I say, and the boys look up from what they had been doing to shake their heads. Neville's face falls a little more, becoming tearful. He seemed ready to wail in distress.

"If we do see it, we'll come find you," Harry says quickly. The ginger-haired boy across from him nods fervently. "He'll turn up eventually."

"Thank you," Neville mutters, sniffling a little.

From the corner of my eye I notice that in the hand of the redhead sits a filthy, wriggling rat, the boy's battered wand pointed at it. "You do realize performing magic outside of Hogwarts is illegal, right?" I say, eyebrows raised in challenge.

The boy lowers his wand sheepishly. "Right."

"What were you trying to do to the poor creature anyway?" I ask, stepping into the compartment. I brush candy wrappers to the floor with the sleeve of my cloak and navigate around them ever so carefully to take a seat across from the red-headed boy. I beckon Neville to follow suit and he hesitates before taking the seat beside me.

"My brothers, Fred and George, taught me a spell to turn him yellow," The boy says, gesturing to his rat. "I haven't tried it yet though."

"Well go on then," I say, careful to lean as far away from the animal as possible. The red head seems taken aback by my request.

"But you just-"

"I am well aware of what I said," I say, waving him off. The boy smiles nervously before turning to his rat.

"Sunshine, daisies, butter, mellow, turn this stupid fat rat yellow." The end of his wand sparks but otherwise does nothing else. The rat is still just as gray as it had been before.

"I don't suppose you considered that perhaps your brothers lied to you?" I suggest, my lips curving into a small smile. Beside me, Neville snorts a little

As the redhead mutters a curse under his breath, the compartment door slides open, causing all heads to turn. We are greeted by puffy-haired Hermione with my cousin at her heel.

"Have you found him?" Hermione asks, seemingly surprised when her eyes land on Neville and I.

"No, but Harry and- sorry what was your name?" I turn to the redhead and his cheeks turn a light shade of pink.

"Ronald Weasley. But you can call me Ron, everyone else does."

"Yes, well Harry and Ronald were practicing magic and I thought it might cheer Neville up," I say, standing to exit. "Unfortunately for Ronald, the spell didn't work."

"Well I've only practiced a few simple spells myself, but they've all worked for me," Hermione says, talking especially fast, "No one in my family is magic, however, so you can imagine how pleased I was." She whips out her own wand, thin and elegant, and points it at Harry. "For example," Harry pales and his eyes go wide. "Oculus repairo."

Harry's broken glasses seem to mend themselves. The glass is no longer cracked and there is no need for tape to hold them together. He takes them off and peers at them, seemingly amazed.

"Thank you," He says in awe.

Hermione nods, smiling brightly. "I'm Hermione Granger by the way. I suppose from the scar on your forehead, you'd be Harry Potter." 

The tips of Harry's ears go a little red in embarrassment. Alice looks at him, jaw tipped open in surprise. Neville on the other hand, well he looks a little faint.

Hermione continues, "I know all about you, of course. I bought a few extra books for some light reading and you were in about three- no four- of them."

"Am I?" Harry seems dazed by the influx of new information.

"Goodness, didn't you know, I'd have found out everything I could if it was me. After all, you are the boy that lived," Hermione says and then, peering down at a little device on her wrists she continues, "Anyway, we'd better go look for Neville's toad while you two get into your robes, I suspect we'll be arriving soon."

With that, she turns on her heel, Alice and Neville following behind.

"Well, I suppose I will see the both of you at the sorting ceremony. Good luck Harry, Ronald." I nod at both of them in turn with a smile and follow the trio out the compartment.

"Neville and I can keep looking while you and Selina dress," Hermione says to Alice as I step out the compartment, closing the door behind me.

"Sounds good," Alice agrees, looking at me questioningly.

"That may be best," I say.

Alice and I turn to head back to the compartment. How convenient, of course, that it should be on the opposite end of the train.

"What are we to do if we do get into opposite houses?" I muse aloud.

"Oh you worry too much, Lina," Alice says with a small smile.

"Cousin, you are far too optimistic for your own good," I say with a short laugh.

"I suppose," Alice agrees, looking thoughtful as we approach our compartment. I stop her in front of the door.

"If we do -get into different houses I mean- you have to promise you'll still remember me," I say, sticking out my pinky finger.

"How could I forget," Alice hooks her pinky through mine with a reassuring smile.

We make our way inside and shrug off our robes, revealing expensive and rather extravagant dresses we wore beneath. Mum insisted, but it seemed a bit much judging by what everyone else wore.

We finished dressing and heard a clamoring of feet outside our compartment. Alice opens it, peering out in curiosity.

"What is it?" I ask, opening the compartment door a little larger so that I might be able to see as well.

"We're here."

Author's Note

I am so so incredibly sorry for this very late update. My schedule has just been super crazy and it's like I've literally only been doing school work. I had midterms last week that I had to study for and they went horribly so, there's that. All around, I have just been too stressed to do much. In any case, I really hope I can get back on schedule with updates but I highly doubt that so I'm just going to say I update when I update and I hope you guys are willing to stick with me.